The destruction apparently began when a broken chair was thrown into a fireplace being used to heat the building, a furnished residence used in the summer by Middlebury's Bread Loaf writer's program, Hodsden said.

A cabin on the property where Frost is said to have done some of his writing was untouched.

Lisa Boudah, Middlebury's public safety director, said officials are reviewing plans to beef up security.

Frost, the author of The Road Not Taken and The Gift Outright, summered at the site for more than 20 years before his death in 1963.